Out of the Darkness

More from Hollywood . . .

Continuing from my last post, here are some more words to think about from the conversations I heard at Central Coast Writers Conference:

 

Author/screenwriter, Doug Richardson and Screenwriter, Rob Edwards stated, “The DNA of a writer is in the first 6 pages."

1. What makes your writing different and special after you’ve learned the craft?

2. Think of the top 10 movies that resonate with you. Break them down and define that something you have to add to that conversation.

This seems like a more incisive way to evaluate your writing than trying to define it by finding 10 books that are like yours that you can refer to when pitching/marketing your novel. It gets you deeper into your own writing and thereafter you may need to tweak your writing to bring it into better alignment with your deepest reasons/motivations for writing what you’ve chosen to write; your art. At least it did for me.

Now, they were talking about movies but I applied this to my novel writing (with the hope of someday seeing it translated to film).

• I thought immediately of one movie that resonates with me. Blade Runner (based on the short Sci-Fi story by Philip Dick: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep). It’s a story that takes the reader through the dark recesses of the human psyche into the basic human feelings of empathy, love and loneliness. It touches on the crucial questions: What is reality? and What is illusion? Trying to think of 10 novels like mine left me clueless. Maybe because I'm more visual and the images of Blade Runner are more visceral. And, I haven't found anyone who is writing like I'm writing. I'm sure they are out there, I just haven't found them.

I looked at my novel Dance the Dream Awake with their questions and this movie in mind. I broke it down to its basic elements. My story does deal with the dark recesses of the human psyche (especially my short stories). I am concerned with reality versus illusion. And a love story emerges from the dark—with hope for a positive resolution.

• As to their second question, how do I add to that conversation? I return to the ancient wisdom of indigenous people that I glean through their stories and images (minus the superstition) and add a supernatural element.

So, I work at bringing ancient secrets forward, then re-imagining them in the light of today’s scientific advances. Out of the dark nightmares my protagonist Tessa is having, emerges the story, Dance the Dream Awake. As she descends into the modern Mayan world of the Yucatan jungle—she has to metaphorically descend (just like the ancient Maya in their rituals) into “the underworld” where she goes through trials. She has to use her skills and intelligence to outwit the “demons” (metaphorically--no demons in my writing) that await her, in hopes of being put back together; restored to wholeness.

There were questions from my last post as to how you keep the writing business separate from the art part. I think this answers it: 

• Rob Edwards and Doug Richardson’s advice: keep churning your idea until you have the angle that people will want to read, and that will sell.

The business informs your writing. It doesn’t change what you’re writing; your art/way of viewing the world, it helps you better define it.

Do you agree or not? Add your two cents (or three or four) in the comments.

The Mesoamerican Biggies

Or, Maya, Aztec and Olmec civilizations - Part 3 in the series of the trip (Part 1) that led to the inspiration (Part 2) for my first novel.

The Maya first settled around 2600 B.C. in early Mesoamerica (what is now Mexico and Guatemala). They became more sophisticated in the latter years (A.D. 250 through A.D. 900) from the influence of the Olmecs who came on the scene later (1400 B.C.—lasting about 1000 years).

The Olmecs built no major cities or pyramids as the Maya did, but were good farmers, artists, mathematicians, and astronomers. They wrote in hieroglyphics, as did most of the cultures that followed them. The giant round Olmec heads (3-meters or 9 ft. tall) resemble African warriors. The name “Olmec” was derived from Aztec writings. We don’t know what they called themselves.

Only after the Maya adopted much of their culture from the Olmecs, did they go on to create their impressive legacy that today extends through Guatemala, El Salvador, Belize and Honduras. They were ruled by powerful war lord kings and priests. What happened to the Maya as a great civilization is still a mystery with many theories (though their descents are still alive today).

The Aztecs followed about 400 years after the Mayan civilization began to shrink. In the early 1300s, so the story goes, the wandering tribe of Mexica people were looking for a home. Persecuted and cast out from other nations, they believed that their god, Huitzilopochtli, the god of war, the sun and human sacrifice, would show them a sign to guide them to their new settlement. Huitzilopochtli is said to have directed the wandering tribe to look for “the prickly pear cactus upon which they would see an eagle perched,” and that's where they would build their new city (the symbol used on the

Mexican flag).

They found such a place on a small, swampy island in the middle of (what is now known as) Lake Texcoco and founded Tenochtitlan, in A.D. 1325. Later, the Spaniards conquered the Aztecs and they built Mexico City over Tenochtitlan.

There is evidence of a connection between the Aztecs and Native Americans. Obsidian and macaw feathers from further south in Mexico have been in found in the Southwest United States—so there were obviously trade routes between the two areas. Southwest Native Americans built ball courts and doorways in styles similar to their counterparts farther South in Maya territory. The ancient world was definitely connected.

The setting for my novel, Dance the Dream Awake, is on Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula near Tulum—Maya country. Both present day and past life take place around the Cobá pyramid complex (a large metropolis composed of many cities within the eastern Yucatan).

Although only a few of the estimated 6,500 structures have been uncovered on Coba’s quiet and peaceful grounds, it may have once had the largest population (an estimated 100,000 people) living in its domain of all the ancient Mayan cities (600-900 A.D.).

My novel about to be released this week (May 9) is a romantic suspense, so today I’ll share a snippet of the romance that begins to brew on the plane to Mexico City when Tessa first meets Nick, an archaeologist with a dig at Coba, close to where she will be staying.

*

The final boarding call was being announced when I reached the half-empty plane late that night. I felt stressed and wanted a last cigarette. Quitting was the pits.

As soon as the plane was in the air, I ordered a gin and tonic and buried myself in a magazine until the flight attendant returned. After downing half my drink in one gulp, I sat back, took a deep breath and closed my eyes, trying not to want that cigarette.

“Can I buy you another drink? You’ll be through that one pretty quick.”

I looked into the palest green eyes I’d ever seen. I hadn’t noticed the man who’d slipped into the seat across the aisle.

He smiled. “You look super stressed,” he said. “If it’s the flying, another drink will take the edge off.”

I sat a little straighter. He was tall, I could tell by the way his tanned legs spilled out of his khaki shorts and straddled the seat in front of him. The rolled-up sleeves of his blue, cotton shirt revealed muscular arms.

“Maybe one more. Thanks.” His manner soothed me.

“Vacationing in Mexico City?” he asked.

“I’ll be staying in the Yucatan.”

His face brightened. “What a coincidence. I’m headed for the Yucatan, too. I’m meeting up with some of my colleagues down there, on the peninsula in Coba. Anthropological research on the Maya.” He lowered his voice and leaned close. “We have a new archeological dig in the jungle near one of the older pyramids.”

“The Maya?”

“Yeah, there have been some exciting new discoveries recently and we’re right in the thick of it.”

His enthusiasm reminded me of a boy opening a packet of gum, hoping to find his first Babe Ruth or Hank Aaron baseball card, or whoever it was that young boys looked for these days. He rattled off some technical details to impress me. I half-paid attention to what he was saying, wondering at this uncanny coincidence. I observed the lock of sandy colored hair that danced above one eye as he talked. Occasionally he’d brush it back, but it belligerently worked itself loose as he continued talking. I took another sip of my drink and tried not to stare.

As if he’d picked up on my thoughts, he suddenly cocked his head and studied me a moment. I caught a twinkle in his eye, “Maybe we’ll bump into each other there.”

The thought had already crossed my mind. “Can I ask you a question? Did the Maya have sacrificial rituals like the Aztecs?” I looked interested, like I didn’t already know.

“Did they! They were obsessed with sacrifice. They had some masochistic practices—” He hesitated, glancing at my white linen suit and the hair I’d done in a long, conservative braid. He must have decided what he had to tell me would either shock me, disgust me, or some such thing. “Let me just say they were very religious and serious about their sacrifices,” he continued with that pleased look a man gets when he feels he’s been gallant about shielding a woman from locker-room language too distasteful for her tender ears. Old school—polite and respectful, I liked that. He ordered another round of drinks and extended his hand. It was warm, firm, with calluses from working in the earth. “My name is Nick Richardson.”

“I’m Teresa Harper. Just call me Tessa.”

*

If my novel and the Maya interest you, I will be sharing more on my Facebook Author Page and here on my blog in future posts. 

Questions? Comments? -- leave them here or on Facebook.

Hot Coffee, Croissant and Angst

I decided to shake things up a bit this morning. It was cold—that is, cold for California—well okay, chilly. It was quite chilly and foggy. 

I took my two dogs out into the damp air to the groomer’s. My little Chihuahua was shaking and happy to go inside to be fawned over in their waiting arms. Not so for my long haired Lhasa Apso, Buddy. He’s a loner and doesn’t like all the fussing like Milton does. He headed toward the exit the minute I put him down.

After getting them settled in, I decided a short trip to the La Boulangerie French Bakery & Cafe was in order. Warm, fragrant and soothing—seemed like a good idea on what could have been a downer morning.

 With coffee and a bag of sweets in hand, I sat outside to listen to a live Dixieland Band group that were gathered to perform that early morning. They played Bye, Bye Blackbird while an older couple danced on the sidewalk, a small child bounced in time to the music and his parents drank coffee and texted—yup a good morning even though the cold metal chair was a challenge to my tush. 

Sparrows descended as soon as I took my first bite of almond Croissant—which  being French was very light and flaky. Crumbs dropped intentionally and unintentionally. Where the heck do all those sparrows come from? Duh, Cora, if it's winter, cold and damp, and if you had to eat every day, wouldn't you choose the eaves of that particular building?

I sipped my coffee (yes!!! love me that strong brew), and taking a suggestion from the craft book I’m studying, completed an exercise by penning this moment into my main character’s POV:

Tessa whispered the words of the lyrics while the laughing couple danced to the Dixieland tune, Bye, Bye blackbird.

“Where somebody waits for me…sugar’s sweet and so is he.”

She closed her eyes to stem the tears.  Jack, in her studio last night, alone. Calling her, wanting her.

"…nobody here can love and understand me…oh, what hard-luck stories they all hand me."

She  threw crumbs to the greedy chirping birds that only came for what they could get from her. Jack was different, now, wasn't he? Could she trust him with her already broken heart? Or was she headed for another fall.

“...make my bed, light the light, I'll arrive late tonight...black bird, bye, bye.”

 Will I use that in my novel? Time will tell. At least it's given me a fresh perspective. 

(I'm not a great fan of Dixieland, so I've included Joe Cocker's version of Bye Bye Blackbird.)

Have you done something to freshen up your perspective when in the midst of a novel? 

I highly recommend it—even if you’re not a novel writer. Change is good I always say. Do you agree?